That's it folks!

Well, this is it.
Last day.
Tomorrow morning, alarm set at 6am.
Brushing teeth, eating breakfast, putting the last few things away, the last bags in the car, leaving the keys behind (how strange is that, I'll have no keys of mine anymore...).
And then setting off before 8am for Rosslare Harbour, where the ferry will be bringing us to Cherbourg the next day.
Bye bye Ireland.
My car is in Claregalway with a friend who agreed to play the middle man to sell it. Ads are in the Galway Advertiser for the next two weeks, and in the Buy and Sell too.
I can feel it will get sold soon.
It will be just fine, as usual.
And now what?
A feeling of emptiness but also excitement.
Sadness, grief and also joy.
The path to Santiago is calling me.
California is calling me.
Adventure is calling me.
Now it is past midnight, I'd better get to bed if I don't want to be wrecked for the big day tomorrow.
I wonder if I'll sleep...

Last days...

It feels a bit strange today.
I went into town, to the market, with my dad and my aunt, and it felt like there was something special in the air. As if there was a festival or so.
Yes, there were people from twin city Lorient who organised a breton market, and there was also Celtic music and dancing, but there wasn't as much people around it as there would be in a real festival.
No really, maybe it was just the feeling of summer, with the sun shining and relative heat around (20 degrees Celsius today, summer temperature for Ireland!!). Or maybe it just felt special because I am leaving and I knew it would be my last time on the market.
Or at least my last time as a resident in Ireland.
Since the barbecue on Thursday, with all the people I said goodbye to, it really feels like I am leaving, and I am not quite sure what to make of it.
Obviously there are mixed feelings, after all, I spent seven and a half years of my life here, which means it is where I spent most of my adult life. I was 21 when I arrived.
A seven-year-cycle later, here I am, almost leaving.
I really have no idea what to make of it.
Well, tonight I will finish all my bottles of alcohol with my dad, aunt and landlord and landlady. Don't be scared, there isn't that much left.
But it will be fun, and less to bring back.
And I am sure I will be fine tomorrow :-)

Webcam, Skype and lots of fun!

Here is a great picture of my dad and me having fun with the webcam, while talking to my mum over Skype. We had a great time!
So my dad and my aunt arrived without any problem yesterday evening, exhausted after the whole journey, so they had an early night, and we went around town today.
The weather has improved today, it was raining a bit this morning, but it is nice and sunny now. From the window where we are looking through now, I can't see one cloud.
So I'd better go now as my dad is getting hungry and starting to nag me about what I am going to make, and should we start to do something now, and if yes, what, etc... So I'll go and start cooking before he starves altogether!
Apart from that, only the car to sell and I'll be ready to go!
I am pretty sure it will happen soon, and everything will be ok.

Spa bliss

This afternoon I went to the spa with a friend. I had promised her that I would invite her to the Thermal suite in the Radisson Hotel for her birthday, and even though her birthday was in January, I never got to it until today. Better late than never, definitely.
And it was great! We spent time in the aroma grotto, on the beach (yes they have an indoor beach), in saunas and steamrooms, in tropical showers and cold mists, and on wonderful relaxing heated chairs.
We got out of there giggling, but relaxed and tired as if we had run a marathon. The chicken and chips with the glass of Sauvignon blanc was welcome after that.
So now I feel all relaxed.
I have only few things left to do regarding packing tonight - I intend to sort out the bathroom stuff, shoes and most of the clothes I know I won't wear until I leave - and I would like to take a bit of time doing a law of attraction meditation before going to sleep. I know that I need, and want, to stay focused right now.
It is too easy to slip down the road of fear and worry. After all it IS a big transition, and many things still need to be sorted somehow before I leave.
But really worrying about them will not help, so I might as well just projecting exactly what I want, knowing that I will attract what I think about most.
So phew! It feels like I have turned the whole worry thing around. But let's not rest on our successes, and stay focused in the right direction instead.

Strange, but interesting times...

It has been yet another while since I last posted anything here.
I feel like I am living in strange times.
Really since the laptop story nothing is quite the same.
My parents called me on Monday evening, i.e. at the time they were supposed to take the ferry, to tell me that mum's ID card is expired and they wouldn't let them on the ferry. So the next few days were filled with frantic attempts to get an emergency passport, or some kind of ID organised for my mum before Monday (tomorrow) which was the date we had rescheduled the ferry to.
However all failed, and my dad is going to have to come here with my mum's sister.
It's not the ideal situation, but no one died or had an accident, and it is really not the end of the world. Also it is giving me a few more days to finish the packing, and meet up one last time with people I haven't seen in a long time.
But somehow it didn't flow very well.
Things are not flowing so well at the moment.
Strange, as they really did at the beginning of my getting ready to move. I sold most of my little stuff very quickly, and have now packed most of what I keep, so I just need to sort and pack bathroom stuff and clothes and I am done.
But, one big thing that is still waiting is the car. I haven't sold it yet, and have had absolutely no phone call about it this week, although I put an ad in many different papers/websites, with lower prices than last week.
Obviously, the fact that I am not selling it makes me worry about it, which probably pushes the very thing I am looking for away from me.
I know I need to relax, trust and let go.
Looking this morning at the reasons why I worry, I found out that selling the car is only one step. From it should come the money I need for the rest of the year. So if I don't manage to sell it, or somehow lose that money, I am stuck with enough money for maybe two months, but far from my dream of taking it easy until the end of the year, and taking my time to go to the States and explore before I have to really do something. So my fear of not selling the car comes down to another fear, the one of not having enough money. And that fear is linked to the fear of not being able to attract the money I need and want for the rest of my life.
I know about the law of attraction, have read about it, and am painfully aware that I should know better than that.
But then again I also know that the best thing I can do in any situation is to embrace it, rather than try to make myself feel better by beating myself up for any "unreasonable" feelings I might have.
So that's what I'll do.
I have dug out my Emotional Freedom Technique documentation, so I can tap the feelings and emotions away. What I like about the EFT releasing technique is that it helps me first accept, and often really find out whatever I am feeling, before letting it go. So it goes with the flow, instead of beating the feeling out of me with pure force. That means it doesn't leave any residues of the little victim in me who cries "but I am ENTITLED to feel that way! Look at how I was wronged!!"
I also reminded myself of one of the basic law of attraction rules: if I want to be wealthy, or attract money in any way, I really need to be, think and act like a wealthy person... Now how would a wealthy person feel about my car? They would probably not worry one bit about it. I mean, if you are a millionaire, you are not going to sweat because you don't know if you will get the 13000 Euro that the car is worth... And as a result, you probably sell it, and get that money or more in no time!
Also a wealthy person wouldn't worry about how to get money for the end of the year, or even for the rest of their life!
So there.
The answer is pretty clear.
So what would a millionaire do today? Probably have breakfast, meet the people they have said they'd meet, and spend the rest of the day doing what they really like.
So that's what I'll do! I am going in a couple of hours to meet a friend of mine whom I haven't seen in a year, and who just had a baby, so that'll be nice.
And then I'll go home and write, because I really feel like it and I haven't done it in a long time.

Sun, Friends, and a bottle of wine

I had planned on packing everything today, or at least as much as I could.
I know I won't get much done in the next few days, as my parents are arriving on Wednesday afternoon, and tomorrow morning I have an appointment at the dentist's, and then I go to work on the organic farm. On Wednesday I have my last Tai Chi session, and then I will probably meet a friend for a last time before my parents arrive.
I would like to do as much as I can while I am on my own, it is just easier that way.
So I had started well in the morning, until I went to my landlady around 1pm, to invite her to the last barbecue I have organised as a goodbye party the Thursday before I leave.
She accepted the invitation for her and her husband gladly, and ended up offering me a glass of wine. It was the middle of the day, and quite hot (at least for Ireland), nevertheless I thought why not, and accepted.
Well, we ended up chatting away for at least a couple of hours, sitting in the sun, and drinking the whole bottle of Beaujolais between the two of us. Ouch!
I felt a bit dizzy when I came back home, and in no state at all to do any packing.
As soon as I felt I had sobered up enough I went on the internet to catch up with friends over Skype, and have been at the computer ever since. Now it is 9:15pm, I haven't eaten or packed, and I have a movie to watch tonight.
But it's OK.
I feel good, and am glad to have such a lovely landlady. I enjoy spending time with her, and at the end of the day, if I am not here to share my time with people, then what am I here for!! Certainly I wasn't born to just pack stuff...
So I'll do a bit more tonight, and tomorrow somehow between things.
All will be well. I know that.

The laptop adventures

What a day!
I have been swimming in a surreal atmosphere since I woke up this morning.
It only just got better now, after just getting my laptop back!!
Here is what happened.
Last week, just before Easter, I called the repair guys, asking what was going on with the laptop and if the missing part had been received, and I was told that yes, and that the laptop had left the workshop on Wednesday, so I should receive it, considering Easter, on Wednesday this week.
When I saw that I had received nothing on Thursday, I called again and, after being redirected from here to there, calling a number in the UK many times and waiting on hold for many long minutes, I was told that it should be delivered that day (Thursday, so) and that if it wasn't, here was the Galway number where I could check up on the delivery today.
So this morning, as nothing had arrived yesterday, I called, and was told that I could go to the depot (only about 5 min drive from my place) and collect it.
I jumped into my clothes, and drove there like a mad woman, just couldn't wait to have the computer back, after all that waiting time!
Only when I got there, there was no laptop of mine to be found. And the guy at the depot soon found that it had been signed for yesterday by a J McGrath. That sounds like my landlord's name, so I went home, called my landlord to check if maybe he took it for me. I was a bit surprised, as I had seen him the night before, and he had never mentioned anything. Knowing him, that was weird.
And sure enough, he never knew anything about a laptop, and wasn't even home until 6pm yesterday! So it wasn't him.
I went to see his wife, catching her at her morning tea in her bathrobe (it was not even 9am by then), and asked her if she knew anything about it. She didn't, but checked with her sister in law, who lives opposite my cottage, if she had received it by chance. No luck there either.
I was running out of guesses, so decided to call the carrier again and see where it had been delivered exactly. It turned out the driver had left a slip in the letter box of some house he thought to be mine, and a woman had called back, saying she knew me, and the laptop had been delivered again, and subsequently signed for by J McGrath.
I found out after a few more calls that some guy in a black BMW actually met the driver half way and collected the laptop directly. Incredible isn't it?
I thought, only in Ireland would things be so easy going that something like that could happen...
Anyway, it took a lot of calls, worries, strange scares and interesting stories about the neighbours who apparently got my laptop (you see apparently four police cars were seen around the place last weekend, and at another occasion men were spotted, carrying boxes around the place with rubber gloves... Juicy rumours heh?) to finally get it back.
Of course the charger didn't come back with it, so I still have to call the repair guys on Monday and have a pleasant phone call, but at least I have the laptop!! Woooooohooooo!!
OK I'll leave it at that for today, but I'd say I'll spend quite a bit of time on the laptop, and on the internet, in the next few days. After all I have many internet hours to use for the rest of the month now!

Transition blues

The weather is getting cloudy here.
Still warm enough though.
I am leaving Ireland soon and it is starting to hit home.
Strange feeling.
I have never really gone through anything quite like this before, as I have never left a country after living in it for so long (almost seven and a half years!), apart from home, but that doesn't really count, does it? Leaving home is quite different.
Plenty of things left to do, I have to start calling companies to stop accounts, change addresses and all. Also I have to continue to sort through my stuff, to make sure that I sell/give/get rid of everything I don't want to bring back.
What will come next?
How will it come?
I don't know.
I am excited about walking the path to Santiago soon, and about moving to California, even though I have no idea how that is going to happen. Trust, I guess.
I have two main directions to look at right now: I could do wholesale of crystals. Living in California would be great for that as I can find most of the most common crystals in the US, Canada or in South America. I would love to go to the mines and choose the stones and crystals myself. But I have no idea of what is really involved there. I need to investigate that first.
Then I could do something like working on/owning a vineyard. I'd love that. But to do that I need some more qualifications than what I have. I'll have a look at summer oenology courses in Bordeaux when I am there. Could be really cool, and I have always loved the wine culture, not to mention the fact that I come from there, and it is really in my blood.
Well, lots of exciting things ahead really!

Laptop blues

I miss my laptop.
I miss writing on it.
I miss the freedom of being able to connect to the internet whenever I want, and from my bedroom, even if the connection is dial-up and pretty slow.
I find it hard to write real stuff, different from a diary, on paper. Stories always come to me better on the computer. But then, I need space and time. I need the space to put my own music, or none if I wish to. And the time to get up and grab a cup of herbal tea, or go and take a bath, before resuming my writing. All of that is not possible in internet cafes.
Internet cafes are fine for checking emails, or placing ads online. That's OK.
But they don't work well for creativity.
The good thing is, I have learnt an awful lot about myself and my use of computers in the last while where I have been weaned off my laptop. And now that I know all that, I can't wait to get it back.
And now I am late in my writing assignment. I really thought I would make it, thinking a couple of hours in an internet cafe on top of what I had written on paper would nail it. But last night as I sat in front of the computer at the back of the video shop in Claregalway, it felt very clear that I wasn't going to write a bit. So I emailed my tutor instead, apologising for the delay and explaining my circumstances. Hopefully it will be alright. Well it really has to be.
OK I'll stop lamenting now and will get out in the sun, enjoying a good book, or maybe strolling amongst tourists and pink Irish people in Shop Street.
Talk soon, and Happy Easter!!

Easter eggs and lambs

What a day!
What a week really!
I have started to sell my stuff very quickly, much quicker than I thought. Incredible! I even sold things I never thought of selling!
So far so good, I have just entered two ads in two papers, one for my car and one for my electric piano. Tomorrow I will leave another add for the piano in a music shop in town, and then I just need to wait for the phone calls. We'll see how it goes. But looking at how quick it went so far, I can only trust that it will flow perfectly, and that everything will be sold at the perfect time.
So today I went to see a friend of mine in the country side about 30 min from where I live. We had planned to discuss what we want to do in our lives, as we are both at transition points, and it is easier to have someone to talk to in order to dig into ideas and explore possibilities. So we did that, enjoying yet another gorgeous day, lying outside in a hammoc, right beside a field full of sheep and young lambs.
We lay there happily, snacking on rice cakes with peanut butter and Easter egg, and I took many pictures of lambs, in order to try my new performant camera and see what kind of pictures it takes.
And by the way, I should get my laptop back next week, it had already left the workshop last Wednesday. Woohoo!
I really have to say, life is good.

Just a quick note

I have a few minutes left on that pay as you go internet thingy in the hotel in Claregalway, so thought I would just add a quick note here...
Today is again one of these fabulous extremely sunny and almost warm days. Seems it is going to hold until the Easter weekend, which is great.
I feel a little bit lost without my laptop. It is hard to write without it, and especially to edit what I write. I have an assignment due tomorrow, and I am not sure how I am going to type and send it...
I need to check this computer, maybe I could write on a word document for free, maybe it only charges for the internet. The advantage is, it is close to my house, and quite handy. And it is quiet, there is only one computer there, and no need to go into town. I'll ask the hotel reception about it before I go.
I have made a list at last of all the stuff I have to sell, gave it to my landlady who is going to buy some stuff. It's great.
I need to put an add in the paper to sell my car.
I feel I really have to trust that everything will work out alright, that I will manage to sell everything that really matters on time. But I can feel that I am doing the right thing, everything is flowing well, so I know it will flow like that until the end.
OK better leave now, running out of time.

Galway summer

I checked yesterday, and it seems they are waiting for some parts before I can get my laptop back. So far, no idea when I will get it back.
So I continue with internet cafes every so often. It is not that bad really. So far I manage.
Today has been a gorgeous day so far, still is. Very sunny, almost warm, certainly very warm for Ireland at this time of the year. Not one cloud. And anyone who has ever been in Ireland will know that THAT is rare.
We had our Tai Chi class outside, right beside the river, and we could hear the water and the seagulls while we were moving slowly, breathing in breathing out, and staying centered. A nice big white dog even came to visit us, drawing a smile from our focussed faces. Then I had my lunch at a terrace outside, followed by a lovely coffee, and it felt like the tourist season really has started. The pedestrian streets were full of people strolling, laughing and taking pictures. It felt like summer.
I like the summer in Galway. It feels like everything, and everyone, becomes easier. Suddenly there is no rush anymore. People sit at cafe terraces, or on the grass at the Spanish Arch near the river and in Eyre Square. More people play music on the streets. Women wear tiny tops and short skirts, men T-shirts and sunglasses, all Irish-skinned people are as red as lobsters by noon, but stay in the sun anyway, making sure they won't be able to lie down on any of their sides at night for a while. It seems sunblock is uncool.
Well I have to say the sun in Ireland is unexpectedly strong, and it happened to me quite a few times to get sunburnt, even though I am dark-skinned by Irish standards, and tan easily. The thing is, there is always wind around here, and it is never really warm, so people don't feel how much the sun actually burns.
I am going to go back home now, back to my list of things to do and my books to read and to write.
My heart is light throughout this transition.
I know I will miss Ireland when I leave.
I also know it will always stay with me no matter where I go.

The legendary loveliness of Irish people

I haven't got the laptop back yet, but then again I haven't been home since about 11 this morning, and forgot my mobile phone at home, so if the transporter tried to call me, well,...
I am using the time when I am in town and close to internet cafes to drop into one, check my email and post a little something here.
I have been amazed yet again at how nice Irish people can be. I had just brought my bin outside, and was playing with my landlord's young female boxer, when he came out with a load of washing to hang, and started to talk with me. Within two minutes I was invited in and a glass of lovely French white wine (dry, but soft and fruity) was put in my hand. I watched one of the usual Irish soaps with his wife, and had a chat with both of them about different things.
As I started talking about all the things I had to do before leaving Ireland, all the things I had to get rid of, sell or give, she said: "Why don't you make a list of everything you have to sell, and I will pass it around to see if anyone I know would buy stuff off you."
How nice. Things are just so easy with them.
It feels safe.
I know that if there is anything, they are just two houses down the road and I can walk there easily to ask them anything.
I think I will miss the Irish warmth and hospitality when I go...

I'm back! Well almost...

It's been a long time and I sure have missed posting on my blog... And writing in general as well.
At the same time I have seen amazing landscapes in Donegal, Northern Ireland and around Dublin. I hadn't realised that I still had so much to discover in Ireland.
The Giant's Causeway area is just fabulous, so is Newgrange and Tara, especially the fact that the Hill of Tara is an open site, and there are sheep on the actual hill. We went there in the evening around sunset time, and could come really close to the sheep, even lambs, without them running away like they usually do. There was something special there.
So now I am back home and alone, unfortunately still without the laptop though. I hope to get it back this week, and if it is not there on Monday I will make sure to call the support line to check on it.
The deadline for my next assignment in the writing course in on the 6th of April so I really need the laptop to write and send it now.
Now I need to move forward quickly, and organise my departure from Ireland.
I need to sell my car, and many of my things like my electric piano, my kitchen appliances, bookshelves, books and other things I won't think of until I start packing them. Days of fun ahead!! But strangely enough I am looking forward to it, decluttering again, getting rid of the old and making space for the new.
I know life keeps getting better, so there is really no need to stay attached to the old, as I already know the new will be so much better and fulfilling.
The only thing to do is to let go, and trust.
That has not always been easy in my life, but it seems to get easier the more I do it.
OK I'd better get back home now, I've been in this internet cafe forever and the weather is so beautiful outside today that it is a pity to stay inside.
I'm looking forward to being able to post more regularly here, hopefully soon.
In the meantime, all the best to all!!